“What Stephen King does best is mixing the everyday, or what you might call the mundane, with the fantastical. In my view, [The Dark Tower] novels are a mix between sci-fi and fantasy and modern times. That exact mix is so Stephen King.”

King vertelde over de film:

“[The movie] starts in media res, in the middle of the story instead of at the beginning,” King says. “Which may upset some of the fans a little bit, but they’ll get behind it, because it is the story.”

Arcel zei over Idris Elba:

“For me, it just clicked. He’s such a formidable man,” says Arcel. “I had to go to Idris and tell him my vision for the entire journey with Roland and the ka-tet. We discussed, who is this character? What’s he about? What’s his quest? What’s his psychology? We tried to figure out if we saw the same guy. And we absolutely had all the same ideas and thoughts. He had a unique vision for who Roland would be.”

Arcel vindt de casting van Matthew McConaughey een logische keuze:

“Matthew is an incredible actor who can do anything. That’s how I feel about Walter Padick. He could do anything…He is this timeless sorcerer, and being a Stephen King fan, I’ve read and experienced Walter in various iterations. He has a very interesting way of seeing the world. He sees it with a sort of delight, even though he is obviously on the wrong side of the light-and-dark spectrum. He’s someone I’ve been having a lot of fun with.”